John and Jill Nth QLD Travels: Airlie Beach

We had a wonderful week at Airlie Beach at a resort park, with a large heated pool. So many things to see and do. Spent a lovely day visiting secluded Hydeaway Bay for a swim. Monte's Restaurant was delightful for a long lunch of freshly caught fish and chips, on the shady verandah. Best fish and chips ever! We loved every minute of our cruise out to the Whitsunday Islands from Shute Harbour. We snorkelled at Langford reef which was shallow so easy to see the coral and the coral was just off the beach. It had lots of colourful soft and hard corals and small coloured fish. Water was lovely and clear too. It was as lovely as the outer reef we visited from Cairns. We enjoyed the stunning white sands and a short bushwalk up a hill to a lookout to see some other islands out from Whitehaven beach. Our guide told us he saw a black Taipan snake, 2 days before so he was being careful. We were careful too when he later told us you only have 45 mins to get help if one bites you, which is unlikely out there.

Our last part of the cruise was a visit to the lovely Hayman Island Resort. We swam in their lagoon style pool and saw red starfish, stingrays and small sharks in their resort "lagoon". We had a warm and very calm trip which was very scenic way to see the Whitsunday islands and very relaxing.

We also enjoyed swimming at the large lagoon style pool next to Airlie Beach and the visiting the Airlie Beach Markets. We did a bush walk at Shute Harbour to Coral Beach and saw a green tree snake. We loved sitting looking for turtles on Coral Beach. We look forward to coming back here again.